Saturday, September 6, 2014

Our Little Baker

This morning it was rainy and a surprising 64 degress, yesterday it got up to 97!  With the rain and added darkness Carter slept in until 7:20!  Talk about the perfect way to start our Saturday.  My parents are visiting to do some more work on Thomas' house.  It looks like he'll be ready to move in soon.  He plans to stay at our house while we are in Florida next week with Ty's family (we can't wait!!!) so he can take care of Harper and Skippy.  Then he should be ready to move into his house when we return.  We had some over-ripe bananas I had meant to make banana bread with the day before and hadn't.  My mom decided to whip some up with Carter.  He mashed the bananas with a potato masher, added all the ingredients together in a bowl with some help, and mixed everything up.  He looked so cute concentrating so hard as he worked and got a little bit messy at first so we pulled out an apron Gigi made me for Christmas one year.  It is adjustable and an added bonus is that it fits Carter!  Other than pulling out a chunk of banana, taking a bite, and then throwing it back in, he was all business.  He also wanted to touch the raw egg, but did really well when we told him it was yucky and would make him sick because it had to be baked.  After that all I had to say was "yucky, yuck" if he went to touch it and he'd stop.  He was so proud of his banana bread and kept wanting to go look at it while it was in the oven.  He would come over to me and say "I, I, I" and then lead me over to the oven to show me the banana bread.  I think he said "I, I, I" because he had made it.

Smashing bananas before it got too messy.
Adding an egg grampy cracked into a measuring cup for him.
Mommy, look, I'm mixing!
Extreme concentration.

The view from behind was so cute!
Grammy helping to add vanilla.
He wanted to use the teaspoon to drop the flour in a little at a time...

Since the weather was so perfect I headed out for my long run shortly after the bread went into the oven.  My parents said Carter kept wanting to get the bread out of the oven and they would tell him, "It's not ready yet".  So he went and got an oven mitt and stood by the oven saying, "Ready!?"  I'm not sure how they finally distracted him as the bread had to cook for an hour!  When the bread was ready he was extremely excited and enjoyed a few pieces before I got home.  It was so nice to come home to the smell of fresh banana bread that even after my 10 mile run was still warm.  I swear it tasted even better knowing that Carter had made it.  It was so cute to see how proud he was and how excited he was to eat the banana bread.  It's amazing how children react when they have ownership of a project.  I was amazed time and time again at school how proud children were over even the smallest tasks, simply because they were trusted to do it themselves.  Carter and I have cooked together before, but I must say it was a lot more fun with 3 adults to 1 toddler! 
Checking on the bread in the oven.
Ready to get it out!
Excited to try his creation!
Tastes better when you make it yourself!

4 comments:

  1. Too cute! We had a rainy morning, too! (Though an 80 degree one..) And we made zucchini muffins! I love how helpful they are at this age and how excited they get to stir and pour and point out ingredients!

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    1. I know, I wish they'd always be this helpful! Boo to still being 80 degrees, but our crazy weather shifts are also why we're tornado alley. So not always a good thing!

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